Dr Ron Behrens, from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said the benefit of airport screening would be "very small", while there would be disruption to "large numbers of people".

"It appears not to be a scientific decision but a political one," he said.

Dr Ben Neuman, a virologist at the University of Reading, warned that the screening would clash with the beginning of the flu season.

“In the early stages, Ebola can be indistinguishable from the flu, but it can also have aspects of other winter viruses like colds and norovirus," he said.

“These diseases usually develop differently over a few days, but in a situation where a screener only gets one chance to decide whether a passenger is an Ebola risk, other winter diseases will probably be mistaken for Ebola.

“It would not surprise me if airport screening measures mainly caught unfortunate passengers with seasonal ailments who were unlucky enough to have recently been to Africa.”

Prof Derek Macallan, professor of infectious diseases and medicine at St George's University of London, also agreed that airport screening for Ebola would prove "really difficult"

However he added: "If it raises awareness for people with fevers who have travelled abroad to seek medical advice, then it can only be a good thing."

The outbreak in West Africa shows no signs of slowing and measures to screen passengers could be in place for many months. The disease has already claimed 4,033 lives, and a further 8,399 across seven countries are believed to be infected.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has warned the epidemic is the "most severe acute health emergency in modern times", with cases doubling every three to four weeks.

Mr Hunt said plans were in place should there be a need to "surge" bed capacity to treat Ebola cases. This would include beds in Newcastle, Liverpool and Sheffield, bringing the total to 26.

Call handlers on the NHS's 111 service are also poised to question anyone ringing up with possible symptoms of the disease about their recent travel history to see if they have been to west Africa.

Whitehall's Cobra emergency committee will meet tomorrow (weds), "to test how resilient the structures are between the constituent parts of the United Kingdom", Mr Hunt told MPs.

David Cameron also insisted "vigorous steps" were being taken to prevent Ebola reaching the UK and defended screening.

The Prime Minister said Britain was doing more than almost any other country to help solve the crisis in west Africa.